hold a mirror up to life…..are there layers you can see?

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MY LIFE THROUGH MY T-SHIRT COLLECTION- THE TOMAHAWK CHOP

I’ve thought about this often over the years- hating a team because they beat your team. What were they supposed to do play to lose? They were doing their job. But of course being a sports fan has little to do with logic or common sense. I hate the Atlanta Braves to this day and it has been nearly 25 years since the Sid Slides game in 1992 when my Pirates were one inning away from the World Series and blew it.

I’ve always had a big dislike for the New York Yankees and thought they were my most hated franchise in sports- until they played the Atlanta Braves in the World Series. I found myself from the first pitch on rooting for the Yankees and was happy when they won. When I look back on those Braves teams they were a likable team individually but they were wearing Brave uniforms. I also disliked the Braves because it seemed to me the fans in Atlanta showed little interest in the sport until the Braves started winning and then you got that annoying tomahawk chop that they stole from Florida State aka Free Shoes U.

The Braves beating the my Pirates that year changed me as a fan. After that game I was depressed for ten days. Since then I haven’t invested my emotions in a team that much with one exception- last season with the Leicester City team on their way to the Premier League title- at 5000-1 odds. If they Foxes had blown that at the end it would have been very depressing. Other than that- since the Sid Slides game- my Steelers have lost a couple Super Bowls- I was asleep an hour after both games ended. The Pirates after 20 years of losing seasons made the playoffs three years in a row- and lost- I could live with it.

I bought the t-shirt above I bought outside of Three River Stadium before one of the 1992 playoff games. It was like $5 another t-shirt I’ve never worn- but felt I just had to have!